Jammu-Kashmir Dy CM Nirmal Singh : Will take call on Article 370, 35 A once in majority government

JAMMU, Aug 15 : Deputy Chief Minister Dr Nirmal Singh on Tuesday said that Bharatiya Janta Party will take a call on issues like Article 370 and Article 35 A when it forms the government on its own in Jammu-Kashmir.

“The BJP stand on Article 370 and Article 35 A is very clear and we still stick to our stand,” Singh told reporters after the Independence Day parade in Jammu.

“If people of Jammu-Kashmir give us 44 plus seats in the Legislative Assembly, we will take a call on them (Article 370 and Article 35 A),” he said, adding “but today the government is sticking to the agenda of the alliance in which, we have agreed to maintain status quo on constitutional provisions”.

Referring to former Chief Minister Omar Abdullah claim that repealing of Article 35 A will hit people of Jammu the most, Singh, who also happens to be a senior BJP leader, said that he shall debate the issue with facts and figures in public. “We are in a democratic set up and there shall be debate in democracy that what has been the impact of the things which have been in the Constitution for last 70 years. Till today, they have been only misleading the people…Let them debate and come with facts and figures,” he said.

Appealing to the Opposition, including the National Conference, to not politicise the debate surrounding Article 35 A, Singh said the matter is in Supreme Court and they should have faith in it.

On the standoff between India and China at Doklam, Singh appreciated Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Central government for their handling the way latter had been trying to surround us. “Today China, who had been bullying everybody in the world, must have realized that it was an India of 2017 and not of 1962 whom it had attacked by deceit,” he said.

Pointing out that China, in connivance with Pakistan, was already occupying 5,152 sq kms of the area of Jammu-Kashmir illegally, he said that “if it again tried to play mischief and enter our territory, it will have to face defeat”.

He also criticized Pakistan for aiding and abetting terrorism in Kashmir. Pointing out that PM Modi in his Independence Day address has given a clear message to the Kashmiri youth that they should shun violence and come to the negotiation table for redressal of their grievances, if any. “This is a message of democracy so as to take along everybody, but this shall not be construed as our weakness. Those resorting to gun will be replied with the gun,” he said.